


So Gross

by trash4ficsaboutlurv



Category: Marvel
Genre: F/M, Luke Cage x Claire Temple, M/M, Monica Rambeau x James "Rhodey" Rhodes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-08-22 04:44:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8273291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trash4ficsaboutlurv/pseuds/trash4ficsaboutlurv
Summary: Claire and Luke host a Halloween party. This is a pseudo-sequel to this fic (although they can definitely be read independently of each other.)





	

Sam arrived at Claire's a couple hours before the Halloween party was set to start because he knew if he set foot in his apartment, he was going to climb in his bed and fall asleep. Vigorous first-time sex with Steve the night before had worn him out (contrary to all the smack he'd talked in the afterglow) and it had taken a lot just to make it through a light paperwork day at the VA. His friend Lynn had taken one look at him and demanded every sordid detail, but Sam had sipped his coffee and said smugly, "A gentleman doesn't tell." 

Lynn rolled her eyes, closed Sam's office door, and dropped into the seat on the other side of Sam's desk. "It was Steve, right? Because I swear if you tell me it wasn't Steve, I'm gonna kick the shit out of you." 

"Then it hardly behooves me to say it wasn't," Sam twinkled, enjoying keeping Lynn in the dark.  

Lynn had listened to all of Sam's agonizing and uncertainty since he realized he had a massive crush on his best friend. It wasn't like he could talk to anyone else about it. His brother – well, Gideon tried, he really did, but he was so bad at his own relationships that Sam couldn't put stock in anything he said. And his sister Sarah was so happily married and overflowing with perfect children that she didn't remember the devastation of unrequited love. Anniversaries and family vacations and smiling Christmas cards had all but buried her memories of bad dates, awful relationships, and drawn out heartaches. She thought the whole world was sunshine. Which was nice, sure, but it really, really made Sam want to hurl her and her perfect family into a swamp sometimes.  

His other options were Claire, Luke, Rhodey, or Monica, but they were happily paired off with one another and advice from couples was worse than advice from a teenage freshly woken to the idea of romance. Having dated Misty, Sam didn't think it was in good taste to drown her in his sorrows about Steve. Which left Lynn, who was only too happy to listen. She said she was getting good karma in case she and her long-time partner Erica ever broke up and she needed to cash in some complaining days. But Sam knew Lynn just really liked to laugh at his pathetic over-analysis of every interaction he had with Steve.  

Sam had brought Steve as his plus-one to the VA Christmas party last December (paid for by a kind benefactor the last few years; Sam was 80% sure Tony was somehow involved and that it was his way of apologizing for how things went down at the airport way back when) and Lynn had marveled that it was almost impossible to tell that Sam was nervous or insecure around Steve.  

"You're so suave and funny. You're like a perfect version of yourself around him." 

Sam had shrugged, watching Steve across the room interacting with some of the vets who'd come out.  "I turn all my feelings of inadequacy into charm," Sam explained and then downed his spiked punch because Steve had just looked around, caught his eye, and smiled.  

"For what it's worth," Lynn said, taking Sam's cup away and moving them away from the punch table, "Steve is totally in love with you, too. I think he's just a little dazzled." 

Which she was _supposed_ to say. It's what friends were supposed to do. Bend the truth so your buddy's ego doesn't crumble into dust and get carried away on the winds of truth.  

How things changed. Ten months later and Sam could explain in beautiful, glorious detail what Steven Grant Rogers sounded like when he came for the third time in an hour saying Sam's name.  

"That smile is saying enough," Lynn said, getting up from her seat and twirling her long black hair around her finger. "You're not _that_ much of  a gentleman." 

When Steve dropped by with the haunted house pie around lunch time, Lynn practically wiggled her eyebrows off her face, while Sam and Steve talked about Claire's party and smiled at each other like a couple of fools and after Steve left, Lynn followed Sam into his office and said, "Oh, boy, you got it baaaaaaaaaaadddddd." 

Claire knew Sam at least as well as Lynn did so when he arrived at eight with a bag of Hershey's kisses, a bottle of red wine, and a suit bag slung over his arm (costume inside), she took one look at him and said, "Somebody got dicked down good." 

"Shut up, Claire." 

"Quick question: Does he have a big dick? Steve looks like the kind of guy whose packing some serious artillery. It's always the quiet ones." 

Sam rolled his eyes and threw his suit bag over the back of the sofa. "I could've had a one-night stand with a beautiful exotic dancer named Enrique." 

Claire smirked. "Not with those star spangled twinkles in your eye. Besides, Nat told me that she interrupted something last night. Doesn't take a genius after that." 

"Are we going to be mature about this?" Sam asked, pouring himself a glass of wine.  

"Tell me if his dick is big and I'll stop asking questions altogether." 

"Why are you like this?" Sam asked, grinning.  

"I told you all about Luke," Claire pointed out.  

"You _volunteered_ every detail!" 

Claire shrugged. "When your man puts it down, you gotta let people know." 

Sam chuckled. "Yeah, Claire, Steve's got it going on." 

"Whoo!" Claire sighed. "If I'd met Steve before Luke..." She shook her head.  

"Just what a man likes to hear," Luke said, appearing out of the bedroom, clad only in a pelt skin over his junk.  

"Tarzan?" Sam squeaked, trying not to ogle. It was made very difficult not only because of Luke's incredible physique, but because he was making his pecs do that Terry Crews thing that was very distracting and impressive.  

"Claire's gonna be Jane. But maybe I should give my loincloth to Steve, since he gets her blood pumping." 

Claire looked unfazed by Luke's words. "A girl can think about some hypotheticals when she's married. No harm in that. I know who the king of my jungle is." 

Luke grabbed Claire's ass. "Yeah, ya do." 

"Guys," Sam said. "Please." 

Claire wrapped her arms around Luke's waist and smoothed the back of his loincloth. "Sammy finally sealed the deal with Steve," she said, smiling. 

Luke nodded his congratulations over Claire's head. "I think Nat bet Rhodey it wouldn't happen before Christmas." 

"Rhodey was banking on your risk-taking tendencies," Claire explained to Sam.  

"While Nat was thinking that your consideration of Steve's natural timidity would hold you back." 

"I for one thought you two would grow gray hairs before you did anything," Claire admitted. 

"And I had money that you and Steve were fucking on the sly all along." 

Sam scowled. "I hate you guys. I just want you to know that." 

"Like you weren't right in the middle of the betting pool on Monica vs. Carol," Claire said, disentangling herself from her husband to put her hands on her hips.  

Luke laughed. "Danvers never stood a chance when Monica set her eyes on our boy."  

"James never stood a chance," Claire corrected.  

Luke nodded his agreement.  

Sam rolled his eyes and cast around for a subject change. "Why are you dressed so early?" he asked Luke and waved his hands vaguely at the glory of Luke's hardly-there costume. 

Luke grinned. "It fell to me to pass out candy to the kiddies and they started coming around seven." 

"He wanted to give the moms a treat too," Claire said. She draped some fake cobwebs along the mini bar. "Babe, can you hang the lights on the wall. I already put in the nails." 

"Sure thing," Luke said.  

Sam, Luke, and Claire worked in harmony to turn Claire and Luke's place into a haunted venue complete with cobwebs, twinkly lights, a smoke machine, three skeletons artfully placed, and several jack-o-lanterns that Claire had swiped from the hospital because 'cutting pumpkins wasn't in her skill set.' 

By the time the first guests had arrived. Claire had changed into her matching torn-animal skin get-up and Sam had put on his ill-fitting, 70s style suit and teeny-weeny afro wig.  

"What are you supposed to be?" Monica asked, done up in her Bride of Frankenstein's monster outfit complete with a tall wig that lit up like lightning when she pressed a button. 

"Generic Motown Star," Sam said. He held up his microphone and did a classic slide-out and pose.  

Rhodey nodded appreciatively. The bolts in his neck also lit up and the stitches in his face looked almost too real for comfort. "That would've been a slick group idea. Coulda been the Temptations or something." 

"Naw, man," Sam said. "Earth, Wind, and Fire. What's wrong with you?" 

"Earth, Wind, and Fire weren't Motown," Luke pointed out, handing out shots of Fireball.  

Sam, Rhodey, Monica, and Luke got into a lighthearted argument about the best black bands from that era and Claire and Luke's apartment slowly filled with superheroes, Claire's nurse coworkers, Luke's Harlem friends, and a smattering of "I know somebody who knows somebody who knows an invited guest" types.  

Steve arrived some time in there bearing a platter of cupcakes mounted to look like a witch's hat, but he fell under the rabid appetite of party guests with too much wine and beer in their system and not enough solids.  

Misty and Colleen arrived in 90s goth girl outfits, Misty with a miniature keyboard and Colleen with a miniature sparkly guitar, Luna and Thorn of the Hex Girls from Scooby Doo -- an esoteric reference if ever there were. Natasha was Dusk, the third Hex Girl and Bucky was wearing a very lazy lumberjack costume (plaid shirt, beanie, and jeans) with an actual axe that Luke smartly put in the hall closet before too much alcohol was consumed and bad ideas started looking like good ones.  Sharon had come as an angel -- the biblical kind that was covered in eyes and had six wings. She looked terrifying but in the best way possible.

Matt Murdock was a priest and Sam overheard Claire asking him if he was wearing a hairshirt under the costume in a very sincere, concerned tone. 

It took Sam a bit of finagling to cross the crowded room toward Steve without looking like that's what he was doing and Sam felt like he talked to every person in the room before he was within a foot of Steve, who was talking to Karen (dressed as Britney Spears from her "Toxic" video, a stuffed snake draped over her shoulders). 

"How is what he did different from what you guys do?" Karen was asking. 

Steve wiped frosting off his chin. "I've never taken an automatic weapon into a warehouse and laid waste to a dozen people." 

"But you've killed people who were doing bad things," Karen said.  

"It's a difference of—Sam, hey! Karen, Sam's here." 

Karen smiled prettily. "I see that." She turned to Sam. "Who are you supposed to be?" 

"Marvin Gaye?" Steve guessed. 

Sam chuckled. "You _would_ think that. It's as good an answer as anything. Did Thor lend you the get up?" Sam tapped the breastplate of Steve's Thor costume.  

"Store-bought," Steve said.  

"Looks good." 

"Which part?"

"The armor. The hair."

"Hmm, should I grow my hair out like Thor?" 

"I like your hair like Steve's." 

"Yeah? What else do you like about me?" 

"Ugh. I'm gonna--" Karen began, then sidled away as quickly as she could.

Sam laughed. "Are we going to be that couple that no one wants to hang around because we're so gross?" 

Steve nodded. "I think so." 

Sam rested his hands on Steve's hips. "Claire's building has rooftop access. I bet it looks nice up there." 

Steve licked his lips. "It'll probably be cold." 

"Guess we'll have to be creative about how to stay warm. Let me think. What could we possibly do for warmth?" 

Steve grabbed Sam's wrist and started pulling him through the crowd towards the door. Anticipation curled in warm, fat ripples through Sam's body, warm and heavy and he didn't even care that he could feel knowing looks from a dozen or so of his closest friends.  

"Just popping out for a second. We need some more, um, beer," Steve said loudly to no one in particular. 

"We have two cases by the fridge," Claire called, laughing. 

Steve pretended not to hear her. "Just getting more beer," he said again and then he and Sam were out the door.  

"Do you think they bought it?" Sam asked, teasingly.  

Steve captured Sam's mouth in a kiss before the words were properly out. He pressed him up against the wall and proceeded to undo Sam with a clever play of lips, tongue, and teeth. Steve's costume was stupidly impossible to get under and Sam groaned somewhere between pleasure and frustration that he couldn't get his hands on Steve's skin fast enough. Steve dragged wet kisses along Sam's jaw to his ear, his breath lighting little fires of need on Sam's skin. "How many floors to the roof?" he asked. 

"Eight," Sam panted. "Elevator's out of order."  

Steve shuddered against him. "Guess I'll have to carry you." 

When Sam and Steve came back downstairs some time later – both smiling, loose-limbed, and ruffled – no one even bothered to ask if they'd actually bought any beer. (Although Sam thought he saw money being exchanged between Natasha and Rhodey – no doubt one of their silly bets.) Monica did ask where Steve's Thor wig had disappeared to, Rhodey pointed out that Sam's tie was crooked, and Claire whispered something that sounded very much like, "So he got that good dick," as she passed, but Sam couldn't be sure. He and Steve clinked their hard cider bottles together and took long swigs from them.  

"Happy Halloween," Steve said, looking as rosy cheeked and lovely as a milkmaid in one of those romantic stories from Shakespeare's time.  

"Happy Halloween," Sam said. 

Colleen crashed drunkenly into Sam's elbow out of nowhere and slurred, "Could you stop looking at each other like that? We get it. You just had amazing sex!" 

Sam and Steve laughed and Sam righted Colleen's balance.  

"You're both so gross right now," she said, poking both of them in the chest. "I hope you know that." 

"We know," Steve said, still smiling at Sam in exactly the way that most people would call grossly in love.  

"Yeah," Sam said, "we know." 

**Author's Note:**

> This is for [my girl's](http://the-omniscient-narrator.tumblr.com/)birthday and I wrote this on very short notice, so forgive all mistakes and plotlessness. Happy Birthday, love!
> 
> (I borrowed Lynn from another fic I wrote [(here)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6245422). She is a joy to write and I thought she needed another outing.)


End file.
